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How does frost form?
Frost on objects is just water vapor in the air that has deposited itself as ice onto a surface. Frost forms on objects close to the ground, such as blades of grass.
At night, a blade of grass loses energy by emitting radiation (a non-lethal kind) while it gains energy by absorbing the energy emitted from surrounding objects. Under clear nighttime skies, objects near the ground emit more radiation than they receive from the sky, and so a blade of grass cools as its energy losses are greater than its energy gains. If the temperature of a grass blade gets cold enough and there is sufficient water vapor in the environment, frost will form on the grass. Continue reading
What is an atmospheric river?
The extreme and persistent drought that has plagued parts of California for several years will be at least slightly remedied by the torrential rains that fell over the weekend over much of the central and northern part of the state.
These rains were associated with a phenomenon called an “atmospheric river.”
Atmospheric rivers are organized flows of deep, moist air from the subtropics and tropics that bring many locations in California a large portion of their annual precipitation. Continue reading
How is the Artic Sea ice situation?
The sea ice cover in the Arctic Ocean is one of the key components of our climate system.
The brightness of the sea ice reflects more solar energy to space than open water. Global warming is amplified in the Arctic as the ice cover decreases. This is referred to as the ice-albedo feedback. Continue reading
Why did two meteorologists receive the Nobel Prize?
It was with great excitement that we learned last week that the Nobel Prize in Physics was shared among three scientists who had each made “groundbreaking contributions to our understanding of complex systems.” Two of the three so awarded were meteorologists, professor Syukuro (Suki) Manabe of Princeton University and professor Klaus Hasselmann of the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology.
Together, they were cited for their work in “the physical modeling of Earth’s climate, quantifying variability and reliably predicting global warming.” Continue reading
What impact did Sputnik have on weather monitoring and predictions?
Sixty-four years ago the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first artificial satellite. This was not welcome news in the United States as it confirmed that the Soviets were well ahead of us in the development of rocket technology. In fact, … Continue reading
